Module 7- Assessment

In my own reading, I used the Cornell Notetaking System because I found it interesting how it could be used for lecture and the reading of the chapter.  Although I knew I would not get to hear a lecture over this chapter, I wanted to use this notetaking system so I would be familiar with it and be able to apply it to future classes.  I often take notes while reading a chapter, otherwise I forget what I read an hour later, and I also always take notes while listening to a lecture.  However, I’ve always been disorganized when it came time to combine the notes.  I always had two sets of notes for each topic, instead of all on one sheet.  As I read this chapter and used Cornell notetaking, I found myself organizing my notes in a way that allowed me add more details to the notes if I were to listen to a lecture over it.  I felt more organized in my thinking as well.  When I finished the chapter, I was able to easily go back and reread the notes with ease and this review helped me to remember what I had read.  I plan to use this type of notetaking in the future. 

Important Concepts

1.     Since I teach kindergarten, I often forget the stress and importance that comes along with high stake testing.  I know there is a lot of pressure not only on the teachers, but on the students as well.  In this chapter, I found out something new that I am surprised I never knew, maybe partly because I don’t teach in a testing grade so I don’t stress a lot about the tests.  But I read that if schools do not perform well enough on the state tests, the state department of education could overtake the school and basically do what they want with it.  I think a lot of times, teachers who teach in non-testing grades are more relaxed, but they shouldn’t be because the students they are teaching are one day going to be taking those tests which ultimately could effect their job..  Even though I have not taught long enough for any of my former students to be old enough to take the state tests yet, I still need to have the mind set that everything I do in my classroom everyday is preparing the students for their tests in later years.  I think a lot of teachers forget about this if they aren’t teaching in a testing grade.

2.     I liked how this strategy emphasized the fact that reading comprehension strategies are very important for testing taking, however, these strategies are a “long term enterprise” (p.380).  Just like a lot of high school and college age students cram to learn material for a test, I think some teachers try to cram for the tests when trying to prepare students for the tests.  Instead of teaching reading comprehension strategies all year long, some wait until the end to really focus.  Another example that applies to a school is tutoring.  A lot of schools offer tutoring in February and March in order to try and cram as much information possible into the students.  Well, why don’t they tutor all year long?  I know a lot probably has to do with money, but why not spread the money out over the couse of the school year?  At our school, they tutor everyday of the week in February and March, but if they only tutored twice a week from the beginning of the school year, the students would probably retain a lot more information and strategies to use on the tests.

3.     The chapter emphasized the importance not to teach to the test.  This happens a lot when trying to prepare students for tests, but the long term effects are not worthwhile.  Students need a variety of skills and strategies, so focusing too much on one skill or strategy, will cause them to not do so well if a problem arises that calls for them to use a different kind of skill or strategy

Implementation

As I mentioned above, even though I do not teach in a testing grade, this chapter made me realize the importance of not being so relaxed in my teaching or thinking.  I need to be thinking that I am preparing these students for the state tests even though they are not taking the tests while they are in my class.  I think if everyone had this mindset, teachers might set higher expectations which results in greater achievement.  So I plan to look at all of the areas I teach and really focus on whether or not what I do is truly meaningful and purposeful in order to get these students to achieve at their highest ability.  This will challenge me to differentiate my instruction more in order to meet the needs of the students who are already at the level in which I am teaching at so that they can be even more prepared and score even higher on those tests when it’s their time to take them.

Strategy

Since I teach kindergarten and it usually takes my students a long time to write a couple of sentences, I figured I did not want to try any notetaking strategy; therefore, I chose to use the Visual Box.  I chose to use this strategy at the end of the week after we had learned the meaning of the vocabulary words.  I allowed them to put these papers in their reading notebook for future use.  For the most part, they drew pictures and labeled the pictures instead of writing a complete sentence, but the most important thing was I found that the students retained the words a lot better after we used this strategy.  The students enjoyed using this type of strategy and I plan to use it in the future.  

Sue Ann Mayberry: Module 2 Phonogical Awareness and Phonics

Sue Ann Mayberry: Module 2 Phonogical Awareness and Phonics: "Quick-Writes was the first thing I used in my classroom from reading these chapters. The second thing I used in my classroom is when I teach..."

Module 6

In my own reading, I used SQ3R.  By using this strategy, I felt that I was able to comprehend the text better because even though I wasn’t reading word for word 3 times, the important concepts were reinforced 3 times as I skimmed over it the 1^st time, read it the 2^nd time and then answered the questions I had come up with.  This will probably help me in the future because I normally have a hard time retaining information I have read the 1^st time.  Hopefully I will be able to recall the text or information easier when I use this strategy.  

Important Concepts

1.     It was very surprising to me to find out that based upon the performance of a school, a child may or may not be learning disabled.  I wonder if the underperforming schools have more learning disabled students?

2.     Since I teach Kindergarten, several things popped out to me as I was reading.  They said the adult’s style of reading aloud is an important factor in preschool literacy development.  It made me wonder if my style of reading aloud is enhancing literacy development or not.  It also mentioned the importance of “meaning-emphasis” versus “skills emphasis”.  In kindergarten, it is hard to not get caught up in the skills because they don’t have any and in my mind, I’m always thinking they need to know this and this and this before going onto first grade, but because of this chapter, I plan be a little more relaxed in that area and focus more on the meaning of text and not so much the skills needed to read the text. 

3.     They mentioned that the development of phonological awareness in early readers should be monitored and when a student is lagging behind, an intervention should be happening.  Even though this is what should be happening, a lot of times, and my school included, principals focus on the students in the upper grades as far as reading intervention.  I have never had reading intervention for my kindergartners.  It makes sense for them to “catch” the students at an early age and correct or help their struggle, rather than allowing the student to get further and further behind and then in 3^rd grade try and help them. 

Implementation

Like I said above, I really plan to not be so skills driven and really focus a lot more time on the meaning of the text.  I know skills are still important, so I plan to find a nice balance of the two.  I also plan to use a lot more writing in my classroom because this chapter reminded me of that importance when it mentioned classrooms need rich text exposure and writing experiences. 

Strategy

I used Possible Sentences in my class of kindergartners.  I used it in a different way than I have in the past.  I had vocabulary words from a book that I wanted them to learn.  I divided the class into small groups and within their group they had to come up with a sentence that would use that vocabulary word.  This time, I had each group use the same vocabulary word.  I wanted them to see how the same word could be used in various sentences.  For the ELL learners, I felt like this really helped them understand the meaning of the vocabulary word by hearing the same word used in various ways.  

Donna Case Study6

Hi my name is Sue Ann I plan on working in the Library at NSU on Monday. I will be on the bottom floor. I posted my question for the survey monkey Friday. I will be happy to come in on Tuesday also and work on group stuff. Let me know. I will be checking e-mail. Monday and Tuesday. I hope to see you there. Sue Ann Mayberry

Donna McFerran 5572: HI! Welcome to READ 5572, the course which will i...

Donna McFerran 5572: HI! Welcome to READ 5572, the course which will i...: "HI! Welcome to READ 5572, the course which will introduce you to the best research-based strategies. Once you learn them, you will surely ..."

Module 5- Case Study

In a sixth grade class of twenty-eight students, composed mostly of English speakers at various levels of ability and skills, the teacher needs to devise strategies which deal with comprehension. Most students do not have a lot of difficulty with word attack, but their reading comprehension scores on a standardize test range from the 22nd percentile to the 65th percentage. In the Oklahoma PASS objective tests, you note that they read the passages but they seemed to miss key points in comprehension. You also know that the students like to discuss the topic but don’t always understand the text and have a hard time supporting their answers from the text.

What are the strengths?

·      The students are good at word attack.

·      Most of the students speak English which allows for discussions to happen and peer teaching.

·      The students have a variety of ability and skills, opening opportunity for peer teaching and class discussions on strategies.

What are the needs?

·      The students need to comprehend what they are reading, as they are reading the text.

·      Standardized test scores need to increase. 

·      Students need to be familiar with before, during, and after reading strategies to increase their comprehensions.

·      They need to be taught to actively read- using background knowledge, questioning the text, using inferences and applying the text to their lives and other texts as they are analyzing the information.

What types of activities and extensions could the teacher do in the classroom?

Activate Prior Knowledge (APK)

·      Make connections between new and known information.  The teacher could divide instruction into three categories of connection as defined by Colleen Buddy - text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world.

Cornell Note taking system diagram during reading

·      A great way for the teacher to model the importance of note-taking while reading

 

 

KWL or “KWL plus” chart for pre, during, & post reading

·      Children could to this as a whole group, adding their own thoughts on stickies to a class chart.

 

Determine Importance

·      Students need to continually sort through and prioritize information they read. The teacher could assist readers in analyzing everything from text features in nonfiction text like bullets and headings, to verbal cues in novels like strong verbs. The teacher brings attention to the student that looking for these clues can help them sift through the relative value of different bits of information in texts.

What strategies/things could the teacher encourage the students to do?

The teacher could teach and have the students use some of the following strategies to help them comprehend the text they read:

Question the Text

Proficient readers are always asking questions while they read. The teacher could have the students use sticky notes (post-its) so that students can stop, mark text, and note questions as they read.

Draw Inferences

Proficient readers use their prior knowledge about a topic and the information they have gleaned in the text thus far to make predictions about what might happen next. When teachers demonstrate or model their reading processes for students through think-alouds, they often stop and predict what will happen next to show how inferring is essential for comprehending text.

Create  Mental Images

Students should constantly create mind pictures as they read, visualizing action, characters, or themes.

Repair Understanding When Meaning Breaks Down

Proficient readers don't just plow ahead through text when it doesn't make sense - they stop and use "fix-up" strategies to restore their understanding. One of the most important fix-up tools is rereading, with teachers demonstrating to students a variety of ways to reread text in order to repair meaning.

Synthesis Information

Synthesis is the most sophisticated of the comprehension strategies, combining elements of connecting, questioning, and inferring. With this strategy, students move from making meaning of the text, to integrating their new understanding into their lives and world view.

Monitor Comprehension

Comprehension monitoring instruction will teach the students to:

• Be aware of what they do understand
• Identify what they do not understand
• Use appropriate strategies to resolve problems in comprehension

Metacognition

Metacognition can be defined as "thinking about thinking." Good readers use metacognitive strategies to think about and have control over their reading. Before reading, they might clarify their purpose for reading and preview the text. During reading, they might monitor their understanding, adjusting their reading speed to fit the difficulty of the text and "fixing" any comprehension problems they have. After reading, they check their understanding of what they read.

Graphic and semantic organizer

 

·      Venn Diagrams

·      Storyboard/Chain of Events

·      Story Map

·      Cause/Effect

·      Creating own dictionary for pre-reading strategy of unknown vocabulary, this could also be a picture dictionary to enhance retention of the meaning of a word.

Answer questions

Questions can be effective because they:

• Give students a purpose for reading
• Focus students' attention on what they are to learn
• Help students to think actively as they read
• Encourage students to monitor their comprehension
• Help students to review content and relate what they have learned to what they already know

Generate questions

By generating questions, students become aware of whether they can answer the questions and if they understand what they are reading. Students learn to ask themselves questions that require them to combine information from different segments of text. For example, students can be taught to ask main idea questions that relate to important information in a text.

Recognize story structure

In story structure instruction, students learn to identify the categories of content (characters, setting, events, problem, resolution). Often, students learn to recognize story structure through the use of story maps. Instruction in story structure improves students' comprehension.

 

Summarize

Summarizing requires students to determine what is important in what they are reading and to put it into their own words. Instruction in summarizing helps students:

• Identify or generate main ideas
• Connect the main or central ideas
• Eliminate unnecessary information
• Remember what they read
• Use this time to incorporate a writing extension to the assignment, to summarize the important details of the text.

QAR

As they answer each question about the text, they identify the Question – Answer Relationship.

·      As students answer the questions they should decide what the relationship between the text and answer to the question is –

o   Right There (RT):  You will find the answer in one sentence.

o   Think & Search (TS):  You will find the answer in the text, but, in more than one place – find the parts to the answer and put them together. 

o   Writer & Me (WM):  You will use the author’s CLUES from the text and your PRIOR KNOWLEDGE to answer the question.                                   

o   On My Own (OMO):  You will find the answer using only your PRIOR KNOWLEDGE.

Module 5- Comprehension

Important Concepts:

1.       As a teacher, you need to CAREFULLY choose the text you read to your class.  Many times we get caught up in the fact that we just need to be reading, that we don’t focus on the strategy we are trying to teach and whether or not the text is a good choice for that strategy.  For example, if we are going to teach a prediction strategy, you would want to choose a text that the students have not read before.  Along with the text being new, you would want the text to have a sequence of events and for it to be able to provide sufficient clues to allow the reader to make informal predictions.

2.        A comprehension routine that was new to me was the Reciprocal Teaching.  I thought students would really enjoy being able to “become” the teacher.  With Reciprocal Teaching, the students get to ask the questions about the text, summarize, ask questions for clarification, and predict what will happen in the next paragraph of the text.

3.       I never really thought about how much word recognition would influence comprehension.  Usually when you think of word recognition, it’s to become more fluent in your reading.  But Word recognition does affect comprehension.  If a student has to sound out words while reading, that takes up most of their capacity in their mind, causing them not to have enough room left for comprehension.  Therefore, when students learn to recognize words fluently, their comprehension improves.

Implementation

I plan to start carefully choosing the books I read.  Sometimes, I get so hung up on using our curriculum and although there are some good resources that come out of our curriculum, it is okay to supplement with other materials.  It is easy to make predictions about any book by looking at the cover, but if I’m truly going to want to focus on a prediction strategy, I would need to use a book that would allow my students to make predictions throughout the entire book. 

Strategy

I used Possible Sentences with my kindergarten students.  We did it a little different that the article, but I presented a book and 5 vocabulary words from that book.  We discussed the meaning of the vocabulary words and then we did a picture walk before reading the book.  After the picture walk, I had the students create sentences that they thought might be in the book, but they had to use one of the vocabulary words in each sentence.  They had to keep in mind the picture that they saw, the meaning of the word.  I kind of helped them decide which vocabulary word might be used on a particular page, but once they had their sentences finished, we read the book the next day.  They loved seeing their sentence on the board compared to the sentence in the book.  And it also helped them to see that there isn’t only one sentence for a word.  We changed the sentence in the book and inserted their sentence to see if we could use their sentence instead.  They really enjoyed this.  I plan to use this in the future.  It helps them to understand the vocabulary words a lot better which in turn helps them to comprehend the story better.